There is controversy in Rome over the gigantic fresco dedicated to Michela Murgia, a writer and feminist activist who died on August 10th from a serious form of kidney cancer. The work, by the artist Laika (the Italian Bansky) and thanks to the project “Remember me as you like” organized by Pietro Turano for Arcigay Roma, was authorized by the V Commune of the Capital, where it is being made, thanks also to the support of Einaudi, Mondadori and Rizzoli (the author's publishing houses). “Knowing that Michela Murgia is still making so much noise fills me with joy – said Laika -; This wall is intended to be a ray of light in this dark historical moment, where they are trying to erase the progress made in terms of rights, to prevent any possible progress.”
The controversies
The works, which will be inaugurated on July 11 at 7 pm, in Via di Torre Annunziata 1 in Rome, have sparked several political controversies. In recent days, Jacopo Coghe, spokesman for Pro Vita & Famiglia, attacked the Democratic administration which, together with the LGBTQIA+ community, “intends to promote the Arcigay initiative also by involving local schools in awareness-raising and in-depth activities on Michela Murgia, a far-left intellectual with a strong ideological orientation, especially on LGBTQIA+ and pro-abortion political issues. Arcigay and the Democratic Party, through the administration led by the president of Commune V Mauro Caliste, are abusing public goods and services to violently impose the ideological thinking of a resolutely divisive author on the entire community,” Coghe had said.
The councilor of Fratelli d'Italia Daniele Rinaldi also expressed his opinion on the realization of the project, raising doubts about compliance with the legislation on safety at work: “To allow the realization of the fresco, pedestrian access to the town hall was prohibited. and this creates major inconveniences because the alley is misused. I will send a note to the local police to report this situation. Elisabetta Piccolotti of Avs intervened in support of the project. “The hatred of the right towards Michela Murgia continues even after her death. The pro-lifers and the FdI invent everything to avoid seeing her smile on a mural in Rome”, writes the red-green parliamentarian in X. “Make peace with us – he concludes – Michela will remain for all of us a symbol of secularism and tolerance”.
Arcigay and Laïka's response
But now it is the curators and the artist who are responding – with a note – to the criticism levelled at the gigantic mural. “I will not let myself be lectured by a political group that criticises a mural and at the same time works to name an airport after one of the most controversial figures in the history of our country,” Laika stresses, referring to the management of Malpensa airport (in Lombardy) to Silvio Berlusconi. And to Pro Vita e Famiglia, the Roman artist advises “to smile from time to time: we are in a democracy (for now) and no one will prevent you from not having an abortion, from getting married and starting a family according to your desires and beliefs. The same freedom must apply to everyone,” he concludes.
The project was born, in fact, from the common desire to pay tribute to the author and intellectual Michela Murgia who “in addition to having supported the activities of our association (Arcigay, ed) – Turano emphasizes – has carried out a fundamental elaboration on queers, parenthood and families, patriarchal and homotransphobic gender violence. This work “is not a holy card – he continues –, but a gift to the community and the city, to celebrate together a woman who has given us tools and new lenses to read our reality and orient ourselves. The response to the instrumental attacks of the right is to participate in the investiture.”
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